Art

03/25/2013

Actress Tilda Swinton
performs the art of sleeping in her one-person piece called "The Maybe," in New
York's Museum of Modern Art, Monday. In "The Maybe," first
performed at the Serpentine Gallery in London in 1995, Swinton lies sleeping in
a glass box for the day. The exhibit will move locations within the museum every
time Swinton performs. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

02/15/2013

A man looks at a poster reading "Census of Jews" displayed
in an exhibition at the Shoah Memorial in Paris, Feb. 12. The
French state prepares to give back seven stolen Nazi-era paintings - four of which
are in the Louvre - to two Jewish families,
after a decade-long tug of war. It ends years of struggle for the two families,
whose claims were all validated by the French prime minister last year. (AP
Photo/Jacques Brinon)

The French government has
announced that seven paintings seized by the Nazis from Jewish collectors and
art dealers in France during World War II are to be returned to their
rightful owners.

Three of the paintings are kept in the illustrious Louvre, while four others hang in French
national museums.

They were part of a massive
haul of 100,000 art works stolen in France by occupying Nazi forces during WWII at the behest of leader and failed art student Adolf Hitler.

The return of the paintings
marks welcome progress in a decades-long battle waged by the descendants of the
Jewish owners whose collections were plundered during the occupation.

The French government
recovered about 60,000 art works following the war, of which about 45,000 were
returned to their rightful owners, and another 10,000 were sold on the open
market. But at the time, ownership of the balance could not be traced – many of
the owners had perished in the Holocaust – and the search for their descendants
effectively ceased in 1950.

But Puerto Rican journalist and
author Hector Feliciano ignited an explosive debate in France in 1995 with the
publication of his book, “The Lost Museum,” in which he listed the looted art
then hanging in French museums and accused the government of not doing enough
to track the art works’ proper inheritors.

The French government had “stonewalled” Feliciano's research at the time and he was forced to turn to U.S.
archives to complete his book.

The French government finally
relented and staged an exhibition of more than 1,000 of 2,058 pieces then housed
in its national collections.

Six of the seven paintings to be returned –
all 17th and18th century works with religious themes –
will be returned to 82-year-old American Thomas Selldorf, a grandson of businessman
and art collector Richard Neumann, who first fled Vienna for Paris, then Spain,
before finally landing in Cuba.

The other painting by Dutch
artist Pieter Jansz van Asch will go back to the family of Czech banker Josef
Wiener who died en route to a Nazi concentration camp in 1942.

The London Times today reports that British officials say they are ready to accept new claims for looted art in its collections. Arts Council England’s senior policy adviser
Gerry McQuillan said a British panel had already returned seven looted paintings since
2001.

Elsewhere around the world descendants of the rightful owners continue their pursuit.

Bill
Schiller has
held bureau postings for the Toronto Star in Johannesburg, Berlin,
London and Beijing. He is a NNA and Amnesty International Award
winner, and a Harvard Nieman Fellow from the class of '06. Follow him
on Twitter @wschiller

02/12/2013

A carnival reveller dressed as a "Peliqueiro" is pictured in
a street in Spain's northwestern village of Laza Feb. 12.
"Peliqueiros", or ancient tax collectors, pursued villagers through the streets
ringing their cowbells and hitting villagers with their sticks. (Miguel
Vidal/Reuters)

02/08/2013

This image provided by the Muscarelle Museum
of Art shows a drawing by Renaissance artist
Michelangelo of a plan for the church of San Giovanni del Florentini in Rome
that is on display at the museum in Williamsburg, Va. The image is one of 25 drawings by Michelangelo beginning a two-city U.S. exhibition in
Virginia on Saturday, including some works never before seen in the U.S. and many that offer a glimpse into the mind of the master and the
tumultuous times in which he lived. (AP Photo/Muscarelle Museum
of Art)

Michelangelo's drawing of Cleopatra that is on
display at the museum in Williamsburg, Va. (AP Photo/Muscarelle Museum of Art)

Michelangelo's drawing of Madonna and Child that is on display at the museum in
Williamsburg, Va. (AP Photo/Muscarelle Museum
of Art)

South Korean military conscripts may have dreamed a
dream of defending the homeland, but their life is one of snow shovelling and
thwarted love - at least in a parody of "Les Misérables" starring real airmen
that has become an Internet hit.

The opera-style video "Les Militaribles" was made by 80 conscripts for $900
and has garnered over a million views in three days, raising hopes it could be
on the way to a repeat of rapper Psy's "Gangnam Style" blockbuster hit.

In the opening scene, a group of young airmen shovel snow to music from the
Claude-Michel Schonberg adaptation of Victor Hugo's novel, singing "Dig down,
dig down, raise your shovels high" to the tune of "Work Song".

"There is no end to this accursed snow. Dig down, you still have two years
service to go," they chant, referring to their national service stint with the
air force.

South Korean men serve for 21 months minimum in the army and longer in the
air force as part of mandatory military service in a nation shadowed by the
threat of North Korea.

During that time, they are cut off from their families and friends for months
on end. They are not even allowed to use smartphones despite living in the most
wired nation on earth.

The parody tells the story of hapless conscript Jean Valjean, or "Airman
24601," who because of the shovelling, manages to spend only 10 minutes with his
visiting girlfriend Cosette. She dumps him - the fate, his comrades assure him,
of any military man.

Besides the take-off of "Work Song," the parody features versions of "I
Dreamed a Dream" and "Red and Black."

"Snow removal is like a black hole. There's no start and no end of it," said
Lieutenant Chung Da-hoon, 25, who directed the video and was a film student
before being called up.

Inspiration came as he and a fellow conscript began singing a song from "Les
Mis" after seeing the movie, he told Reuters.

"We thought we could get sympathy from all Korean men and women who have
brothers or sons. But we didn't expect the response from overseas," he said.

The video has struck a chord not only with the young Korean men who have to
serve in the 600,000 strong armed forces - and for whom autumn means shovelling
leaves and winter shovelling snow - but also celebrities like actor Russell
Crowe, who starred in the Oscar-nominated movie version of "Les Misérables" and
retweeted a link to the video.

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